Torment and Arcanum

[Sorrow]

It works both ways : if these games were realistic you probably wouldn't survive your first combat...

It depends on degree of realism and type of encounter.
For example in this case, my character would either hold the guard on gunpoint and force the accountant to give all the money or he would simply shot both of them.

Also, lack of "realism" creates more problems than it solves - it makes player get damaged by people who should be already out of combat.
When I played Fallout/Arcanum, I often had an advantage of good position and good skills, but I quickly lost it, because the character despite being a very good shooter/fighter couldn't dispose of enemies quickly enough and got overrun.

When I play Fallout with higher weapon damage (and matching armour values), the only situation when my character didn't die less was when he/she encountered multiple enemies and had to engage them all at the same time (but in this case, it would be better to avoid adding such encounters instead of making weapons do low damage.).